Getting back in shape in the mid-market mobile phone segment, Nokia India has recently launched two new models in its Asha range in the mid-price point.
Essentially targeted towards the youth (college students) segment, the targeted segment comprises the mid-market upcountry and the cities in general. However, Nokia India seems to be focusing on strengthening its dual SIM range of phones where it has claimed to be the market leader.
With the new launch in place, Nokia India, however, is also seemingly on a revival mode in the high-price mobility segment as well recently launching new models in the Lumia range of smartphones.
The Indian mobile phone market is growing at 40% y-o-y out of which only 9% comprises the smartphone market and Nokia, Samsung and Black Berry are the key competitors in the segment. Interestingly, out of the total market-size, Nokia claimed that an estimated 1/3rd of the market now comprises of the replacement market. Although over a period of 3 years, Nokia lost a considerable market share in the smartphone and high-price mobility segment, the company seems to be on a revival mode across all price-points; incidentally launching the new devices just after Samsung lost the case against Apple in USA.
Nokia however, declined to comment on its market share in India.
"The Asha range is the outcome of the 3-fold strategy we undertook last year whereby we committed to focus on the smartphone range with the Windows platform, enhance internet connectivity and focus on the innovative front," said V Ramnath, director, sales, Nokia India.
"These phones are manufactured in our unit in Chennai and so far, the Asha range has been an outstanding success. Also, the price point for these phones is unmatched," he added.
Currently, Nokia has 6 mn forum users in India and its latest technologies offer 85% of data compression (resulting in lower carrier rate charges) and a 3 times faster browsing engine.
On the mapping front too, Nokia has performed well after the acquisition of NavTec and leads the offline mapping segment whereby, in India, it covers 2194 city details and has 3.7 mn points of interest.